Contingent Citizens , livre ebook

310

pages

English

Ebooks

2020

Écrit par
Spencer W. McBride; Brent M. Rogers; and Keith A. Erekson

Publié par
Cornell University Press

Lire un extrait

Obtenez un accès à la bibliothèque pour le consulter en ligne En savoir plus

Découvre YouScribe en t'inscrivant gratuitement

Je m'inscris

Découvre YouScribe en t'inscrivant gratuitement

Je m'inscris

310

pages

English

Ebooks

2020

Lire un extrait

Obtenez un accès à la bibliothèque pour le consulter en ligne En savoir plus

Publié par

Cornell University Press

Date de parution

15 mai 2020

Nombre de lectures

EAN13

9781501716744

Langue

English

Poids de l'ouvrage

5 Mo

Contingent Citizens features fourteen essays that track changes in the ways Americans have perceived the Latter-day Saints since the 1830s. From presidential politics, to political violence, to the definition of marriage, to the meaning of sexual equality-the editors and contributors place Mormons in larger American histories of territorial expansion, religious mission, Constitutional interpretation, and state formation. These essays also show that the political support of the Latter-day Saints has proven, at critical junctures, valuable to other political groups. The willingness of Americans to accept Latter-day Saints as full participants in the United States political system has ranged over time and been impelled by political expediency, granting Mormons in the United States an ambiguous status, contingent on changing political needs and perceptions.Contributors: Matthew C. Godfrey, Church History Library; Amy S. Greenberg, Penn State University; J. B. Haws, Brigham Young University; Adam Jortner, Auburn University; Matthew Mason, Brigham Young University; Patrick Q. Mason, Claremont Graduate University; Benjamin E. Park, Sam Houston State University; Thomas Richards, Jr., Springside Chestnut Hill Academy; Natalie Rose, Michigan State University; Stephen Eliot Smith, University of Otago; Rachel St. John, University of California Davis

Voir

Publié par

Cornell University Press

Date de parution

15 mai 2020

Nombre de lectures

EAN13

9781501716744

Langue

English

Poids de l'ouvrage

5 Mo

CONTINGENTCITIZENS

SHI FT I NG PE RCE PT I ONS OF L ATT E R- DAY SAI NTS I N AME RI CAN POL I T I CAL CULT URE

E d i t e d by S p e n c e r W. M c B r i d e , B r e nt M . Ro g e r s , a n d K e i t h A . E r e k s o n

CORNELLUNIVERSITYPRESSIthaca and London

All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review, this book, or parts thereof, must not be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the publisher. For information, address Cornell University Press, Sage House, 512 East State Street, Ithaca NY 14850.

First published 2020 by Cornell University Press

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: McBride, Spencer W., editor. | Rogers, Brent M., editor. | Erekson,Keith A., editor. | Jortner, Adam Joseph. Some little necromancy. Title:Contingentcitizens:shiftingperceptionsofLatter-day Saints inAmerican political culture / edited by Spencer W. McBride, Brent M.Rogers, and Keith A. Erekson. Description: Ithaca : Cornell University Press, 2020. | Includesbibliographical references and index. Identifiers:LCCN2019037679(print)|LCCN2019037680(ebook) | ISBN9781501716737 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781501749544 (paperback) | ISBN9781501716744 (pdf ) | ISBN 9781501716751 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints—Politicalactivity—History. | Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints—Publicopinion—History. | Mormons—Political activity—History. |Mormons— Public opinion—History. | Political culture— UnitedStates—History. | Public opinion—United States—History. Classification:LCCBX8643.P6C662020(print)|LCC BX8643.P6 (ebook) |DDC 289.3/73—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019037679 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019037680

Cover image: Salt Lake Temple with U.S. flag hung to commemorate Utah’s statehood, 1896. Photograph by George W. Reed. Courtesy of Special Collections, J. Willard Marriott Library, The University of Utah.

Contents

Prefaceix Acknowledgments xiii A Note on Style xv

Introduction.NotExceptional,Typical,or Americanized: The Latter-day Saint Experience with American Politics, Keith A. Erekson

Pa rt I : A u t h o r i t y a n d M o b i l i z at i o n 1. “Some Little Necromancy”: Politics, Religion, and the Mormons, 1829–1838, Adam Jortner2. “Many Think This Is a Hoax”: The Newspaper Response to Joseph Smith’s 1844 Presidential Campaign, Spencer W. McBride3. Precarious Protestant Democracy: Mormon and Catholic Conceptions of Democratic Rule in the 1840s, Benjamin E. Park4. “The Woman’s Movement Has Discovered a New Enemy—the Mormon Church”: Church Mobilization against the ERA and the NOW’s Countermobilization in Utah, Natalie K. Rose

viCONTENTS

Pa r t I I : Po w e r a n d S ove r e i g nt y 5. “The Way of the Transgressor Is Hard”: The Black Hawk and Mormon Wars in the Construction of Illinois Political Culture, 1832–1846,Amy S. Greenberg6. “Like a Swarm of Locusts”: Perceptions of Mormon Geopolitical Power in a Non-US West, 1844–1848, Thomas Richards Jr.7. “In the Style of an Independent Sovereign”: Mid-Nineteenth-Century Mormon Martial Law Proclamations in American Political Culture, Brent M. Rogers8. Political Perceptions of Mormon Polygamy and the Struggle for Utah Statehood, 1847–1896, Stephen Eliot Smith9. A Snake in the Sugar: Magazines, the Hardwick Committee, and the Utah-Idaho Sugar Company, 1910–1911, Matthew C. Godfrey

Pa r t I I I : U n i t y a n d N at i o n a l i s m 10. “Rather Than Recognize This Wretched Imposture”: Edward Everett, Rational Religion, and the Territory of Utah/Deseret,Matthew Mason11. Ambiguous Allegiances and Divided Sovereignty: Mormons and Other Uncertain Americans in Nineteenth-Century North America,Rachel St. John12. Mormons at Midcentury: “Crushed Politically, Curtailed Economically,” but Winning “Universal Respect for Their Devotion and Achievements,” J. B. Haws

110

128

146

169

177

193

CONTENTS vii

13. The Historic Conflicts of Our Time: Ezra Taft Benson and Twentieth-Century Media Representations of Latter-day Saints, Patrick Q. Mason

Notes221 About the ContributorsIndex283

279

208

P r e f a c e

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and its members reveal a peculiar irony in the history of the United States. Joseph Smith founded the church in 1830 as American society was under-going a dramatic democratization that extended to the country’s political system. The Latter-day Saints and their religious beliefs arose in a fledgling American democracy, yet Americans have frequently struggled to deter-mine the place of Latter-day Saints in that political system. In a country that celebrates itself as a bastion of freedom, Americans’ use of mob violence, civic decrees, and legal prohibitions reveal a public tension over the extent to which Americans should tolerate the civic participation of their Latter-day Saint neighbors. In this book, we explore the different ways politicians, lawmakers, and the general public perceived the place of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and its members in American political culture throughout the nine-teenth and twentieth centuries. Indeed, historians have long acknowledged the difficulty Americans have experienced in deciding where Latter-day Saints belong in the country’s political realm. In terms of rights and identity, this difficulty has often resulted in American Latter-day Saints existing on an ambiguous plane somewhere between citizens and foreigners. Whereas many scholars have focused on the ambiguous status of Latter-day Saints and their experience in certain historical events or as a lens through which to view particular moments of the American past, we track and examine the evolution of this phenomenon over a period of nearly two 1 centuries.The book comprises chapters that demonstrate the endurance and evolution of this American political problem; they reveal that, while the level of acceptance Latter-day Saints experienced varied over time, the feel-ing that they were not quite fully American prevailed. This theme lies at the heart of the book. However, the characterization of Latter-day Saints in American politi-cal culture is not limited to questions of their peculiarity. In addition to exploring the persistent difficulty of Americans to determine the place of

Voir